Thread: Time to re-introduce a paying for deer/goat tail scheme?

you forgot MPI the greatest snout in the public trough ever made......

Originally Posted by Tahr

Different agencies have different mandates. Doc are only concerned with ecological values on the public estate. ospri are only interested in pest populations that carry TB or are likely to and to infect cattle. That’s getting less and less. The last possum or deer is of no interest to them. Regional Council are cash constrained and only really have a collaborating role with doc and ospri in regards to pests.
Good luck to coordinating, administrating and funding a bounty across that lot.

you are indeed a wise man Tahr

Would personally prefer a subsidy on copper (or any lead-free) bullets than a bounty for tails. Kea blood testing conducted in several areas popular for hunting and without huts (a common source of lead) displayed alarmingly high levels of lead poisoning. For these areas is is fairly assumed that the lead poisoning is coming from scavenged carcasses.

The Waipa district paid out ammo for rabbit tails.
5x.22 or 1x12ga from memory per tail.
I got heaps and I was from a different district.
We got the tails off the road kills before the hawks had even seen them.
Spotlighting as kids the only cost was worn by the old man what petrol we took out of his farm tank and put through his landrover.
We did heaps of miles used to even do Kinloch when it was bit quieter than now.
When they got down in numbers anywhere we used to give it a rest.
The local rabbit board guys used to turn up at home have smoko lunch etc with olds and talk rugby.
Then leave a shit load of ammo as "your boys shoot enough it isn't worth doing your place".
It will be farmed because why would you do the hard stuff.

Originally Posted by LA3LOW

Would personally prefer a subsidy on copper (or any lead-free) bullets than a bounty for tails. Kea blood testing conducted in several areas popular for hunting and without huts (a common source of lead) displayed alarmingly high levels of lead poisoning. For these areas is is fairly assumed that the lead poisoning is coming from scavenged carcasses.

really.......who supplied the coolaid in that drinking fountain??? my sister lives in waikato on a dairy farm not far from puketurua..actually between there and the arapuni dam..she has fruit trees on the farm OLD OLD oldschool fruit called a cumquat??? its like an apricot with taste between that and carrot..every year just as the yripen KAKA turn up....thats a long way to fly from maungatautiri reserve but turn up they do. there might be no huts/lead head nails in area these kea were (caught and stuck with needle to get blood sample before being released?) living in at time of testing.
but sure as God made little green apples the flappy things on either side of those green parrots allow them to venture elsewhere.

Personally, I thought it then and I still think one of the worst decisions made by central government was to disband the Pest Destruction Boards. The three areas I lived in when they were in existence were virtually devoid of anything pest related. Made it tough for a youngster starting out in their hunting career but they certainly had it well under control and were basically down to a maintenance role with minimal staffing levels. I know it’s a case of hindsight but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out the consequences, as we now see, of not keeping on top of a problem when there is no guarantee of complete eradication. It was always going to come back and bite us in the gluteus maximus.

There is no argument against the cost of maintaining small experienced crews around the country, giving them the ability to organise and cooperate with other interested groups when needed to assist maintaining control, as opposed to the monumental waste of taxpayers resources currently going on now. I’ve seen, time and time again, regional councils carrying out poison control of rabbits on private properties and then fail on follow up. Every year throwing it around willy nilly and then failing to monitor outcomes with absolutely no accountability on either themselves or landowners, if they have obligations as well for follow up.

The responsibility of pest control needs to be removed from the departments of ideology and incompetence and returned to a practical, boots on the ground entity, coupled with adequate funding for research, and we’ll be back to seeing some real inroads into the problem. It’s far easier to monitor effectiveness and outcomes vs expenditure with a single entity than the current structures with a multitude of fingers, arms, and boots in the pie. The results will speak for themselves and to hold them accountable you have only one door to knock on.


And yes, there are issues accompanying it, but there must also be some financial incentives involved for private individuals, at least in the interim till control is established. The issues aren’t new, they’re well documented so I’m sure a viable solution can be found.

Bounty system would work if rewards are high enough, take Rhino poaching for example.

Originally Posted by EmpireSafaris

Bounty system would work if rewards are high enough, take Rhino poaching for example.

so the bounty was on dried poachers ears ???? or noses or whole scalp

Ha, in China people used to say "If no buying, there will be no dying", it first refer to eat endangered species and behaviors like eating shark fin and near shore seafood, but then it really refer to buy things online because so many delivery boys and girls on e-bikes have died or badly injured. What I mean is maybe the best way is to let people know how good the wild goat is for eat and for health, especially for those Chinese in NI. I am Chinese, even I do `t eat lots of Chinese dishes and I am small eater, but I know my countryman
I took out several feral goats when I was in Akl, and I gutted them, and cook them in traditional Chinese cuisine, Even I got lack of ingredients but everybody enjoy it, some guy I knew asked me later that when you will go out again and cook it again? I said that is not my house nor my rifle so wait the group news. So basically, the Chinese in NI can eat those goat out. Once before Germany declared a war against China hairy crabs, I was in German company then I asked my associates how bad it is, then Germans said well...too many of them and they match on the street Germans do `t eat them, but if sent 3,000 Chinese down there for couple years, they may will never see hairy crabs again And I am back to China now for a while, now is in the 2nd important holiday in China, the hairy crab at market the price is $10.00 dollar each

Just remember that TB free Nz along side Landcare were quite happy to release TB infected possums in to a TB free area “for research purposes “.

When this kind of stupidity is allowed to be funded by the tax payer, I have no faith in pest free NZ their ideals or strategies!

I know a private pest controller , he was driven out of the industry by being under cut by larger corporations, paying lower wages and paperwork! He has since left the country and is now culling deer in Australia!

His parting words to me, were that pest control is going to the lowest bidder, paying the lowest wages! They will reap what you sow! He expects the pest problems to explode in NZ.

Been following this thread with mild interest. Since April 2014 to present day I have been shooting mainly goats over an area of approx. 520 ha of DOC estate, all but a ha or so bush, and over this period have shot over 3000 goats, numerous pigs, a few dear and more than a few cats. I started doing this when said goats were making a nuisance of themselves at a DOC motorcamp. As time progressed, the area I cover slowly increased to present size.Originaly I could shoot up to 50 animals over maybe 4 hours. These days it's sometimes just an armed day walk, maybe 8-12 km loop, in the bush. As @Barry the hunter and others have noted, it's easy to get good numbers when there is a big population of animals, but when numbers get down thats when the serious work begins. And it is hard (impossible?) to get them all, especially when there is infiltration from border areas. So, even with a bounty, I'm sceptical there would be enough dedicated hunters out there to get the job done. But, as MD has said, 'a dead goat is a good goat'. Just my 2c.

@stingray unfortunately your mate is on the money, there isn’t many outfit that pay their hunters well and despite their social media videos they don’t do as much culling/hunting work as they would have you believe.

Originally Posted by stingray

Just remember that TB free Nz along side Landcare were quite happy to release TB infected possums in to a TB free area “for research purposes “.

When this kind of stupidity is allowed to be funded by the tax payer, I have no faith in pest free NZ their ideals or strategies!

I know a private pest controller , he was driven out of the industry by being under cut by larger corporations, paying lower wages and paperwork! He has since left the country and is now culling deer in Australia!

His parting words to me, were that pest control is going to the lowest bidder, paying the lowest wages! They will reap what you sow! He expects the pest problems to explode in NZ.

There is a report on the scientific trial here: https://www.landcareresearch.co.nz/a...he_Kino_27.pdf
I see that Sue Grey has been on this anti bandwagon. That speaks volumes.

Originally Posted by woods223

Been following this thread with mild interest. Since April 2014 to present day I have been shooting mainly goats over an area of approx. 520 ha of DOC estate, all but a ha or so bush, and over this period have shot over 3000 goats, numerous pigs, a few dear and more than a few cats. I started doing this when said goats were making a nuisance of themselves at a DOC motorcamp. As time progressed, the area I cover slowly increased to present size.Originaly I could shoot up to 50 animals over maybe 4 hours. These days it's sometimes just an armed day walk, maybe 8-12 km loop, in the bush. As @Barry the hunter and others have noted, it's easy to get good numbers when there is a big population of animals, but when numbers get down thats when the serious work begins. And it is hard (impossible?) to get them all, especially when there is infiltration from border areas. So, even with a bounty, I'm sceptical there would be enough dedicated hunters out there to get the job done. But, as MD has said, 'a dead goat is a good goat'. Just my 2c.

good on ya mate for sticking at it - bloody job well done - we shot a block south of Waikaremoana as part of an operation to keep goats out of Te Urewera - mainly sheep stations - we got it down to a goat every two to three days from a high first two weeks of about 20 a day - then it was left for about 3 years - bugger me back to 10-20 first week again - ya just cant sleep when you have a small buffer zone -biggest numbers were between the Ruakituri river and the Hangaroa river out 5 km from Te Urewera boundary - heli shot it over two days 1800 - then two of us did about 30 days for another 1200 - now this area was clean in a culling operation very early 1970,s but we would have needed to go another 5km out for a decent buffer zone just to try and stop goats coming in - I spent 5 years culling along that boundary and into Te Urewera and at times went weeks going over country for no goats - thankfully there were deer and pigs to shoot otherwise would have been bloody boring -- that SE Te Urewera operation went on for years to keep the boundary clean and is probably still checked periodically - bounty do anything in those situations no

@Barry the hunter. Prime example of goat numbers building up was over COVID lockdown bullshit. Even DOC hunters weren’t allowed to get out and about.